Broadway legend Jessica Phillips came out as queer in a brand new interview.
Over the past two years, the coronavirus pandemic has run rampant worldwide.
With numerous lockdowns and careers switching to a “work from home” capacity, people have had more time to reflect on their lives and trajectories.
In a recent interview with People magazine, Phillips opened up about her own reflective lockdown and said it led to her queer awakening.
“When the pandemic hit, I was at the peak of all this self-discovery and exploration,” she said. “The shutdown really knocked the wind out of me.”
The mother of two went on to say that during Broadway’s closure, she temporarily moved to Los Angeles to book television work.
Phillips’ isolation from her New York life helped fuel the exploration of her identity, which led to her coming out.
“It wasn’t about changing identities, rather expanding my identity,” she explained.
Before her monumental realisation, the Next to Normal star had been married to Nicholas Rohlfing. After their divorce in 2011, she tied the knot with Broadway actor Tad Wilson in 2017.
When it came to her transformative stay in LA, she described it as a “beautiful and scary” experience.
“That period of time really was a beautiful experience for me and also really painful and scary and sad because, as you know, when we open ourselves to change and newness, there’s loss attached to that, and there was a lot of loss for me,” she revealed.
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Although she experienced a bittersweet beginning, the talented singer wasted no time rebuilding her life.
After returning to New York, Phillips revealed that she ended things with Wilson and began a relationship with theatre publicist Chelsea Nachman.
At the beginning of their relationship, the duo shared coy snapshots together until Nachman uploaded a photo of them kissing in December.
When asked about her initial reaction to the landmark post, she said she was a mix of “all the emotions.”
“It was super scary and super exhilarating. The celebratory part of it was beautiful to me,” she told the publication. “I was also aware of how surprised people might be or how it might be shocking news to some people.”
While there are still individuals in her life who are unaware of her sexuality, Phillips said that her children are “100 per cent on board and supportive.”
“I had the conversations separately with each of them, and literally they were just like, ‘Oh, oh, great! So proud of you, Mom. That’s great,'” she said.
Phillips is currently staring as Heidi Hansen in Dear Evan Hansen on Broadway.
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